15 "Slow Living" Practices That Changed My Life

ladies and gentlemen Thomas the Caballeros you might not be able to tell by the way that I talk but I am indeed a southerner and as my Southern Louisiana Grandma used to tell me when I was a kid Agustin don't worry don't hurry and take time to smell the flowers we live in a fast-paced hustle culture everyone is obsessed with efficiency and productivity but the reality is we all need to follow Nana's advice and take time to smell the flowers and I am here and Augustine to show you the way so here are 15 slow living practices that changed my life practice one not trying to be number one ladies and gentlemen the thing that drives this fast-paced hustle culture is the dream of getting up on that stage one day and saying I'm number one I'm number one I'm number one everyone wants to be number one nowadays but let me tell you something ladies and gentlemen you don't want to be number one it's the sucker's job because when you're number one you're always paranoid that one day you'll become number two everyone is trying to take advantage of you you get all these fake friends everyone that becomes number one loses their mind and because I want to live a slow life and enjoy my time on planet Earth I strive to be no higher than number four practice two extremely slow walking we often hear people say let's get that heart rate up ladies and gentlemen that is literally the last thing that we need to be doing in our stressed out Society extremely slow walking is something I learned when I was living in South America it's where you're extremely mindful of your walking pace and you walk as slowly as you possibly can and it's extremely calm and relaxing so I challenge you today go for a walk but not for exercising but just to be mindful of your walking pace and you will feel extremely relaxed practice three being extremely intentional the first hour of the day the first hour of the day sets the stage to how the rest of your day is going to go for example if you wake up late for work and you're stressed out in a rush then the rest of the day you're going to be stressed out and in a rush but if you wake up slowly enjoy a cup of coffee and don't rush then the rest of your day is going to follow so be intentional the first hour of the day because if you can get the first hour right then the rest of your day will follow practice four embracing the joy of missing out I just finished reading this book right here it's called 4 000 weeks and what it's basically about is that if you live to 80 years old you will have 4 000 weeks of life you know we often talk about the fear of missing out and wanting to do everything but the reality is it's impossible to do everything if you were lucky you will get 4 000 weeks of life so it is impossible to live life without missing out on things so instead of getting fear of missing out Embrace missing out get joy from it because you could have been doing anything right now but you chose to be listening to El Augustine practice five being less productive productivity it's becoming extremely toxic nowadays where we now have the phrase toxic productivity you know I find that the more productive I try to be the more stressed out and cloud in my mind is which makes me less productive but the more I stop slow down and relax the more I'm able to think clearly and ultimately I'm more productive it's an oxymoron but the less productive you are the more productive you become practice six never getting a cup of coffee to go coffee can be made many different ways there's The French Press there's the mocha pot God forbid there's the Keurig ladies and gentlemen there are some people in this world that just have no class at all I mean it's like they're saying I like my coffee to be brewed in a little plastic cups so some of the plastic gets in the coffee so my coffee tastes like plastic it is unreal how low standard some people have in this world but one thing that bothers me even more is when people get coffee to go when people are in a hurry getting a cup of coffee because the point of a cup of coffee is to chill out and relax and if you ever get a cup of coffee never get it to go because the point of coffee is to slow down and enjoy it practice 7 embracing inconvenient human interactions ladies and gentlemen the goal of most of technology is to take away the human aspect of things I mean we have self-checkout lines we have delivery apps and a million other apps that take away human interaction but these tiny inconvenient human reactions are extremely important to our mental health because it makes us realize that we're all the same we all poop we all fart and we all have diarrhea and it's important to do these small inconvenient human interactions because they're very important to our mental health and it's important to just slow down and embrace all these little things throughout the day practice eight listening to full albums I love music and I love having music on the background except when I'm making videos because you know copyright but one thing that I've noticed when I'm listening to Spotify is that I have this abundance of Music options that I get so focused on choosing the next song instead of enjoying the present song and I end up not appreciating the music and it makes time speed up and one thing that I've noticed and one thing I'm trying to practice is listening to full albums and not being so focused on choosing the next song because there is an art with albums and it's become a lost art but when you listen to an entire album it slows down time and you end up appreciating the music more practice nine not filling every moment of the day with noise same time as much as I love music when you listen to Too Much music you miss the benefits of Silence you know I think in a lot of ways we're scared of Silence so we always have something on in the background whether that's Netflix music or podcasts but when you feel every moment of the day with noise you miss out on the beauty of Silence so in order to slow down I've been taking moments every single day so you just turn off all the noise and embrace silence and once you start to embrace silence you realize how relaxing and calm it is practice 10 leaving my phone behind as much as I hate smartphones if you are a human being in the year 2022 it is mandatory to have a smartphone but one thing that I do to slow down and detach myself from my smartphone is when I do certain activities I leave my phone behind for example if I go to the mountains and go for a hike then I leave my phone in my car if I go to a coffee shop to read or meet someone I leave my phone in my car you know I think that phones have a certain energy and even if you're not using it if it's on you you're thinking about it so in order to slow down when I'm doing certain activities I'll just leave my phone behind practice 11 taking the inconvenient route all we seek now is the convenient route and wanting things very quickly but when you're always seeking convenience you end up being a hurry which speeds up time but if you take the inconvenient route time actually slows down it's very interesting for example I live about one mile away from my library and I could drive and drop off a book in five minutes but I usually prefer to walk there in 30 minutes because you get to enjoy the walk and it breaks up the day and it slows down time so embrace the inconvenient route because it ends up slowing down time practice 12 not obsessing over the clock about a month ago I went to the mountains to Camp with some friends and when it got dark and cold we all sat around the campfire as you do when you're camping and one friend asked what time is it and it's like it doesn't matter time had no relevance at that moment around the campfire but you know I think that we all do this and we all obsess over the clock and live our lives based on what time it is but when you obsess over the clock and you're always wanting to know what time it is time ends up speeding up so as much as possible you know when you don't have to I try to avoid looking at the clock because when I'm so focused and I'm so consumed of knowing what time it is time ends up going quicker practice 13 avoiding scheduling things too far in advance ladies and gentlemen not too long ago I went to the dentist office and after they told me that I had no cavities they asked me would you like to schedule your next dentist appointment in six months and it's like I'll call you guys later who are these people that schedule dentist appointment six months in advance in order to avoid schedule conflicts and basing my whole life around an event I don't like to schedule things too far in advance because when you do that you're so focused on that event and you can't take the time to slow down because you're always anticipating what's next practice 14 stop watching the news I personally do not see any benefit to watching the news I mean I think it's important to be informed and educated but I don't think that you get that from the 24-hour news channels I think that the point of the news and all they're trying to do is to get you to panic so they can sell depression and anxiety medication I mean watch the commercials they know their target audience they know exactly what they're doing so I consume a little bit I read every single day but then I stop and I don't just stress out about all these things I can't control because if you consume too much you know the only thing it's going to do is just make you panic and it's going to stress you out and it's going to make up time speed up so I consume less and it makes time slow down and ultimately just makes me feel better practice 15 taking control over my finances ladies and gentlemen could a video by El agustine be complete without the words personal finance the algorithm says no personal finance is the glue that holds all this stuff together when you take control over your personal finance it allows you to have more control over your life which ultimately slows down time in the good news is that you don't need to be a millionaire all you have to do is budget live below your means and educate yourself on finance that's all you need to do and then you can put some of these practices into practice to live a more slow life you know life is meant to be slow we shouldn't be living in a hurry and when you start to take more control over your personal finances you can finally start telling other people don't worry don't hurry and take time to smell the flowers and with that muchas gracias

Channel: Austin Williams

Views: 91,759

Keywords: Slow Living, Slow

Id: PebLiVgf1G8

Length: 12min 6sec (726 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 18 2022